Cat Rescues Fireman From a Tree

Today, Tiddles, a ginger tom cat, was spotted by Ms. Minerva Bancroft, an interfering dear old lady from Croydon, as he was sitting up a tree in her neighbours front garden while stalking a small pigeon. Mistakenly thinking that Tiddles was stuck up the tree Minerva tried to entice the cat down with a saucer of milk but to no avail. Tiddles just wasn’t thirsty and preferred to be left alone and incognito to his unsuspecting prey. Minerva however was not prepared to leave the matter there and so promptly alerted an off duty fireman with her mobile phone.

When James Miller, a Fire Officer and father of two arrived, Minerva assured him that he had no reason for concern because she had used some of her free allocated mobile phone minutes and did not need reimbursing for the call anyway.

Unfortunately James’s troubles did not end there. Within minutes of explaining that the RSPCA would be the agency that deals in such matters , the pigeon that Tiddles fancied for dinner suddenly flew up to settle on a higher branch leaving the cat with no option but to clamber higher up the tree to adopt a new stakeout position.

Deciding at that point to give Minerva the benefit of doubt, James borrowed a ladder from a nearby window cleaner and placed it against the tree in an attempt to climb up and rescue the cat. James then found to his dismay that by climbing the ladder, both bird and cat, in that order, had decided to move up to the very top of the tree for privacy, leaving James to climb onto a nearby branch to study the situation.

“Climb further up the branches, ”Minerva shouted to the fireman, “Climb further up the branches.”

“Do you know any more f**k*ng jokes?” James called back down.

“Well, I’ve never heard such foul language in all my life,” explained the dear old interfering lady from Croydon rather harshly. “I’m taking your ladder away for that and I won’t be putting it back until you’ve rescued that poor animal.”

At this point, because of the noise made by Minerva removing the ladder, the pigeon flew away and Tiddles decided that a saucer of milk would be better than a bird in the bush after all and slowly climbed down past unlucky James. James noticed how the cat was selecting his pathway through the tree back down to the ground by hoping from branch to branch and by following Tiddles, Fireman James was then able to clamber back to safety himself.

Minerva however, was still very cross with the fireman and informed him that she would not now be writing to the Queen for a bravery award on his behalf after all.